SonomaBouliste

Just because I am younger, doesn't mean I don't know Stones, btw. I play Paint It Black on Guitar Hero III.

Shortly before his death Belushi had been in Sonoma Valley scouting locations for a movie he and Don Novello wanted to make. If my memory serves me, the working title was Sour Grapes. A friend told me Belushi had spent a lot of time at a very funky winery that made some very funky wines. When I heard he had died, my immediate reaction was "Ovaltina, my goat, I hope _______'s wine didn't kill him".

SonomaBouliste

timbyrd wrote:Any truth to the rumors that the character of Bo in "Bottle Shock" was actually patterned a bit after you from those days?

-- T

I don't know how the other, "official", movie (Judgement in Paris) will turn out, but the book was excellent. It did a nice job of describing 60's and 70's Napa Valley and the fledgling wine renaissance. Unlike a lot other wine non-fiction about N. California, most of Judgement in Paris rang true for me.

JOATMON

rpm wrote:First time I heard the Airplane live was in the summer of '66 in Rio Nido up on the Russian River - my memory of the performance has always been surrounded by an awareness of two light shows - one in the venue and the other in my head.

A very wise friend once said of the experience with recreational pharmaceuticals: just remember, it's all real and it's all in your head.

Nobody is sure who has said it; it's been ascribed to Paul Kanter and Jerry Ruben; Robin Williams used to use it in his act.

The implication I always got from the saying is that people who were there in the '60's so fried out on those recreational drugs that they also blasted away any memories of the '60's.

Well, I doubt it was Rubin, who ended up as something of a Yuppie and who was of the view that activism and drugs didn't really mix. Although, in June of 1970, I did personally see him smoking pot and/or hashish and drinking cheap red wine (Red Mountain Burgundy in gallon jugs being passed around) at a party in LA.

There were some people who got that fried out, including some members of some of the SF bands -- I knew at least half-a-dozen kids I went to high school with who literally fried their brains and turned themselves into almost zombies -- but for the most part, we all survived just fine, thank you. Some people get flashbacks, some people don't. YMMV is about all I can say about it.

I think the original import of the saying was intended as a put down of the (relatively numerous, actually) people who never got involved with the counterculture at all and for whom the "sixties" weren't a whole lot different than the "fifties" (which ended in 1963 with JFK's translation to Heaven by LHO).

It depended where you lived/went to college. In California, it arrived fairly early on, by 1965 at the various University of California campuses (except Riverside and Irvine), in the high schools by 1967: just in time for the teens to flock to San Francisco for the Great Summer of Love. Curiously, the real hippies were beginning to move on from SF about that time out to the countryside in many cases. A couple of guys I'd known growing up who were several years older than I was were living in SF in and around the Haight-Ashbury district and going to SF State in the early '60s, were involved the Diggers (who provided free food, clothing, etc. to young runaways, etc.) and the band/drug/party scene.

The best way I can put the change is that when I graduated from high school in 1966, only half-a-dozen or so kids in my Sonoma County high school class (and fewer in the lower classes) had tried pot (other than the "Mexican" thugs, generally referred to as "pachooks" -- from pachuco who were known to smoke "reefers"). When I returned home from Virginia after my first year in college, probably 70% of the then senior class had tried pot and probably 80% of my own classmates had tried pot, though I would put the number who smoked frequently as less than 25%. Serious recreational pharmaceuticals always remained a lot less common than people now think. Even if you went to Golden Gate Park in the Summer of 1967, I'm would suspect less than half the kids hanging around did anything more than smoke pot or maybe a litlle hash. Maybe 20% really did much LSD. Most of what was advertised to kids as mescaline or psylocibin was actually acid, often cut with amphetamines (speed).

Back East, outside of NYC and maybe Boston and Chicago, things came much later, peaking I would say some 3-5 years later than in California. Eastern and Southern colleges were very preppy still in the late 1960s, with alcohol far predominating as the drug of choice. Even musically, things seemed very different: when I brought my Airplane, Doors, Grateful Dead, Big Brother, Moby Grape, Country Joe, etc. albums to college with me, most of my fellow freshmen did not know the bands or what to make of the music -- they were still into the earlier Beatles (pre-Yellow Submarine/Revolver/Magical Mystery Tour/Sgt. Pepper), the Mamas and the Papas, etc. Or Simon and Garfunkel and Arlo Guthrie if you were from NYC....

zTimothyBz

SonomaBouliste wrote:I don't know how the other, "official", movie (Judgement in Paris) will turn out, but the book was excellent. It did a nice job of describing 60's and 70's Napa Valley and the fledgling wine renaissance. Unlike a lot other wine non-fiction about N. California, most of Judgement in Paris rang true for me.

Okay, I've just put in a library request for Judgement of Paris.

A friend tivo-ed John Cleese's Wine for the Confused, and I'm looking forward to seeing that. I was looking at the reviews for it on amazon, and noticed a film called MondoVino. Any opinions?

SonomaBouliste

timbyrd wrote:Okay, I've just put in a library request for Judgement of Paris.

A friend tivo-ed John Cleese's Wine for the Confused, and I'm looking forward to seeing that. I was looking at the reviews for it on amazon, and noticed a film called MondoVino. Any opinions?

-- T

I found Mondovino quite interesting. It is more of an opinion piece than a documentary. Think if Michael Moore made a movie about the world of wine. Jonathon Nossiter definitely has a dislike for globalization and parkerization, and really skewers international consultant Michel Rolland. Overall: I liked it.

SonomaBouliste

Now, now. Like the Moore work it does contain some unfair, out of context exaggerations, but also presents interesting points of view. You don't have to believe everything someone says in order to find them interesting or worthwhile.

zTimothyBz

Loweeel tends to see the world in black and white - or PS and non-PS. But perhaps he'll end up being the hero of his own story.

And by the way SB, you mis-spelled the titles of all those books by Edmund Wells.

Changing the subject to wine...

I've been thinking that with a new year coming, it's a good time to figure out what to be doing in regards to wine. From what clayfu has said, he's gotten into wine in just a few years, like a student learning a language by an intense immersion method. rpm's whole upbringing seems to have kept him immersed in wine.

During my recent trip to Ohio several wine buyers asked me about the quality of the 2008 vintage. It's a common question, and I always preface my answer with an explanation of why you can't generalize about vintages in Northern California. This year's wines will definitely be a mixed bag, with some incredible wines, but also some so-so wines. It takes a while to assess wine quality; you get an idea of flavor and aromatic intensity during crush, but you really have to wait until the wines have gone through ML and settled clear to make a good assessment of balance, mouthfeel and concentration. In general, I'm concerned that the wines from the “first harvest” may be lacking in depth and concentration. I think most of our Cabs and other Bordeaux varieties will be outstanding. Zinfandel was our biggest challenge this year.

Earlier this year, rpm had mentioned 2005 as being an excellent vintage for Napa Cabs (or was that only for certain ones, like Rutherford?) And of course The Parker jump-started his reputation as a wine hater calling the 1982 vintage.

Peter knows these things because he's there, and rpm, well, because he's rpm. But what about a random slob like me with no particular connections to the wine industry? What should I do? Should I even care?

Pull lots of corks! Remember what you taste! (the rpm mantra)

No doubt a profound truth, but another truth is that I'm only going to be able to pull a tiny fraction of the corks that are out there. The "normal" way to deal with this issue nowadays is to just buy wines that have received a high score, typically from you-know-who.

SonomaBouliste

timbyrd wrote:Loweeel tends to see the world in black and white - or PS and non-PS. But perhaps he'll end up being the hero of his own story.

And by the way SB, you mis-spelled the titles of all those books by Edmund Wells.

Changing the subject to wine...

I've been thinking that with a new year coming, it's a good time to figure out what to be doing in regards to wine. From what clayfu has said, he's gotten into wine in just a few years, like a student learning a language by an intense immersion method. rpm's whole upbringing seems to have kept him immersed in wine.

Earlier this year, rpm had mentioned 2005 as being an excellent vintage for Napa Cabs (or was that only for certain ones, like Rutherford?) And of course The Parker jump-started his reputation as a wine hater calling the 1982 vintage.

Peter knows these things because he's there, and rpm, well, because he's rpm. But what about a random slob like me with no particular connections to the wine industry? What should I do? Should I even care?

Pull lots of corks! Remember what you taste! (the rpm mantra)

No doubt a profound truth, but another truth is that I'm only going to be able to pull a tiny fraction of the corks that are out there. The "normal" way to deal with this issue nowadays is to just buy wines that have received a high score, typically from you-know-who.

Ah well, I think I'll go home and pull a cork.

-- T

Wow, when I go into a store to buy wine while visiting relatives it's overwhelming. There are lots of varietals, regions, different vintages and a plethora of brands. Unless you're in the trade, you can't try everything. Critics can be somewhat useful if they describe wines; you can try something and "compare notes" to find out how they describe wines you like. If they only focus on point scores (e.g. WS) they're pretty worthless. A good wine shop person can be better. RPM has it right when he says "Pull lots of corks! Remember what you taste!. Early in my quest I tasted every chance I got: winery tasting rooms, wine shops, tasting groups, wine btg in restaurants, wine tasting events. I never took notes in tasting rooms or restaurants (some people do), but I always did so in tasting groups, wine shop tasting bars and events. I know you have wine shops in your neck of the woods that have tasting areas and regular formal tastings. The good thing about organized or formal tastings is that you can learn from other tasters - if someone says "Wine C has blah blah blah", you can smell/taste that wine and see if what they said is something relevant for you. Sometimes you'll think PAAAaaaAAaaaanCAAAAAKES! are they talking about? but sometimes you'll go ahah! Get a tasting group of 12 people and you can compare 6 wines for half the price of one bottle.
Kermit Lynch says "Just say no to vintage mentality", and he's talking about French wines. Vintage is much less relevant in Sonoma and Napa than it is almost anywhere in France. My rank of importance would be producer>region>vintage.

yumitori

SonomaBouliste wrote:RPM has it right when he says "Pull lots of corks! Remember what you taste!. Early in my quest I tasted every chance I got: winery tasting rooms, wine shops, tasting groups, wine btg in restaurants, wine tasting events. I never took notes in tasting rooms or restaurants (some people do), but I always did so in tasting groups, wine shop tasting bars and events.

I've found that in the Pacific Northwest I tend to get a little better reception from the tasting room staff when I pull out my notebook and start jotting things down.

That said, I don't really feel that my notes are as meaningful as they could be yet. I'm working on improving, but it can be tough. We can't even have tastings in wine shops around here since state law limits the activity to wineries and until recently we hardly had any wineries at all. It's put at least one store out of business since they couldn't share their products with potential customers. Just an other reason I want to move westward as soon as possible.

So for those of us not living in 'wine country' are there books or websites out there that you feel are adequate starting points?

sanity

yumitori wrote:I've found that in the Pacific Northwest I tend to get a little better reception from the tasting room staff when I pull out my notebook and start jotting things down.

That said, I don't really feel that my notes are as meaningful as they could be yet. I'm working on improving, but it can be tough. We can't even have tastings in wine shops around here since state law limits the activity to wineries and until recently we hardly had any wineries at all. It's put at least one store out of business since they couldn't share their products with potential customers. Just an other reason I want to move westward as soon as possible.

So for those of us not living in 'wine country' are there books or websites out there that you feel are adequate starting points?

Later, I'll look up my references and post. What I do each time I drink wine at home, is use my DRY CREEK supplied journal to record my tasting notes, even on the "cheap" stuff. It's blank, no guidelines, so I created my own. I practice to some extent every time I drink wine.

gcdyersb

timbyrd wrote:Okay, I've just put in a library request for Judgement of Paris.

A friend tivo-ed John Cleese's Wine for the Confused, and I'm looking forward to seeing that. I was looking at the reviews for it on amazon, and noticed a film called MondoVino. Any opinions?

-- T

Mondovino is worth your time. But it is definitely an opinion piece more than a balanced presentation of the subject matter. Some of its subjects embarrass themselves without the filmmaker taking their comments out of context (the Staglins and Etcherts are prime examples and you'll wonder what's going on in their minds). The filmmaker goes out of his way, though, to edit his subjects to suit his thesis. Interesting but flawed work.

SonomaBouliste

yumitori wrote:I've found that in the Pacific Northwest I tend to get a little better reception from the tasting room staff when I pull out my notebook and start jotting things down.

That said, I don't really feel that my notes are as meaningful as they could be yet. I'm working on improving, but it can be tough. We can't even have tastings in wine shops around here since state law limits the activity to wineries and until recently we hardly had any wineries at all. It's put at least one store out of business since they couldn't share their products with potential customers. Just an other reason I want to move westward as soon as possible.

So for those of us not living in 'wine country' are there books or websites out there that you feel are adequate starting points?

Starting points? It depends on your goal. Wine is something that should make meals (and, therefore, life) more enjoyable, and I'm not just talking about the alcohol effect. You don't need to be knowledgable about vineyards or winemaking to enjoy wine, and you don't need to have a great descriptive wine vocabulary. I remember going with a friend to taste '78 first growth Bordeaux at a wine shop when they were first released. She told me there wasn't any point in her tasting because she didn't know anything about wine. I had her smell and taste a couple anyway, and her response was Wow! The most important thing to know about wine is whether you enjoy the aroma and taste of a given wine. It is valuable to learn what you like, and remember or write down what you like (and why). If you live in a state where they don't have or allow wine tasting, all the more reason to start your own tasting group with friends. You can start off with more general tastings - maybe several different varietals from large producers to get a basic idea of how different varietals compare. Then maybe you could compare wines from different regions. As you get more experience your tastings will tend to become more esoteric and more expensive. Also, keep in mind that your tastes are likely to change with time.

There are a lot of good books out there if you want to learn about grapes and wine. Wine for Dummies and The Wine Bible by Karen MacNeil (sp?) are good references.

SonomaBouliste

sanity wrote:Later, I'll look up my references and post. What I do each time I drink wine at home, is use my DRY CREEK supplied journal to record my tasting notes, even on the "cheap" stuff. It's blank, no guidelines, so I created my own. I practice to some extent every time I drink wine.

Unless you are in the wine business it's more important that you use terminology that is meaningful to you. I developed a shorthand for common aromas, texture, acidity, sweetness, tannin and common flaws pretty early on so as not to waste time writing rather than focusing on what I was tasting. Nobody else can read my notes, but so what? Though my preferences have evolved, I can still look back at old notes and tell what a given wine was like.

berrda

SonomaBouliste wrote:Unless you are in the wine business it's more important that you use terminology that is meaningful to you. I developed a shorthand for common aromas, texture, acidity, sweetness, tannin and common flaws pretty early on so as not to waste time writing rather than focusing on what I was tasting. Nobody else can read my notes, but so what? Though my preferences have evolved, I can still look back at old notes and tell what a given wine was like.

Peter - You never cease to educate/inspire/amaze. It was said much earlier in this forum, but 'welcome back' from me, too.

SmilingBoognish

Peter,
What do you know about de-stemmers which have been modified to eject zinfandel raisins? A winery which I enjoy mentions on their web site that they have done this, and I would love to know your opinion on this modification.
Much thanks,
wanna be hippy that was born 20 years too late!

SonomaBouliste

SmilingBoognish wrote:Peter,
What do you know about de-stemmers which have been modified to eject zinfandel raisins? A winery which I enjoy mentions on their web site that they have done this, and I would love to know your opinion on this modification.
Much thanks,
wanna be hippy that was born 20 years too late!

P.S. I enjoyed all the Charles Dickens references. ;)

A lot of the raisins do end up with the stems at our winery, but when there are as many as we saw with the Zin this year a lot get through. Some wineries sort fruit post destemming, either manually or with a vibrating belt (the healthy berries roll off, everything that doesn't roll is garbage. That last reminds me of an incident during the early nineties. I looked up the word for stems in my English-Spanish (not Mexican) dictionary, and when I used it Jose's brother Juan gave me this Ever just think about breadsticks?? look. I asked him what the right (Mexican) word was for stems and he replied "basura" - garbage.

The Chinese also announced a similar process using radio waves some years ago. My opinion is that it probably provides some facsimile of "real" aging with cheap wines - kind of like adding vinegar or other adulterants to young wine, as was legalized at Repeal in order to imitate aged wines.
This electric current sounds a bit like a poor man's micro-ox in some ways.

rpm

SonomaBouliste wrote:The Chinese also announced a similar process using radio waves some years ago. My opinion is that it probably provides some facsimile of "real" aging with cheap wines - kind of like adding vinegar or other adulterants to young wine, as was legalized at Repeal in order to imitate aged wines.
This electric current sounds a bit like a poor man's micro-ox in some ways.

Back in the old days, they did all sorts of things to 'fix' wine - I remember a story about one of my great uncles saving something like 100,000 gallons of somebody's wine with ox blood - don't remember exactly what the problem was, or how it solved it (though I once knew, I think it was some sort of clarifying agent), but it was told as an 'old world wisdom' vs. smarty-pants American winemaker story.

SonomaBouliste

Proteins are used to remove unwanted phenolic compounds (including tannins) from wine (fining). These fining agents include albumen (egg white), casein (milk), isinglass (fish), PVPP (synthetic) and gelatin (my little pony?). Blood was another traditional fining agent in old Europe, but is no longer permitted. Fining is a corrective measure that can largely be avoided by good, timely winemaking decisions.

themostrighteous

rpm wrote:Back in the old days, they did all sorts of things to 'fix' wine - I remember a story about one of my great uncles saving something like 100,000 gallons of somebody's wine with ox blood - don't remember exactly what the problem was, or how it solved it (though I once knew, I think it was some sort of clarifying agent), but it was told as an 'old world wisdom' vs. smarty-pants American winemaker story.

i recall reading something about that in your uncle's interview, which i read the majority of prior to the tour (who needs fiction when you can read a tale like that?). ah, yes, p. 22 of the pdf file. technology can be a wonderful thing.

rpm

themostrighteous wrote:i recall reading something about that in your uncle's interview, which i read the majority of prior to the tour (who needs fiction when you can read a tale like that?). ah, yes, p. 22 of the pdf file. technology can be a wonderful thing.

Uncle Tony was even more fascinating, and an amazing mercurial character, in real life. He had absolutely no patience with BS, and did not suffer fools gladly. But, he was not unkind.

Seems plausible in many ways. It's not hard to imagine large electric fields ripping apart polar molecules. And proteins, which are long amino chains twisted into whatever shape electrostatics and thermodynamics favor, will likely get brutally unfolded in some way. But what reactions are favored after that point, I doubt they really know what's going on.

The title that an electric field turns plonk into fine wine is a rather serious exaggeration, though. This method seems like something that will "help" a wine with decent starting material and perhaps make pure plonk halfway drinkable. I wonder what the shelf life of a wine whose phenols have been obliterated is?

zTimothyBz

If I recall correctly, in "The Billionaire's Vinegar", there was a mention of someone submitting an article to one of the wine magazines about how to fake a number of famous old vintages.

And since I've mentioned that book, has anyone else here read it and if so, any opinions? (I know that clayfu was reading it the same time that I was.) Not to put too fine a point upon it, I enjoyed it, partly because Wallace has a sympathetic writing style and partly for the glimpses into an esoteric world

I seem to be responding to Peter's literary twist by bringing up books/films about wine. So here's a twisted quote for him and rpm:

"Wherever wine is resorted to as a strong religion, and as an escape from the dull, monotonous round of home, those of its vintners who pepper the highest will be the surest to please."

This can't be the last of the Ramblings, it just can't - please, SB, I want some more.

javadrinker

Fascinating insight into your world again SB. Been a busy month or I would have read it sooner.

Separately, I was lucky enough to win a winebid auction for one of your 1992 Wellington Estate Bottled Old Vines Criolla. I'm experimenting more and more with older wines (as are a lot of wooters who seem to have an overabundance of recent vintage wines). Any thoughts into what I might find upon poppin' this bad boy?

SonomaBouliste

javadrinker wrote:Fascinating insight into your world again SB. Been a busy month or I would have read it sooner.

Separately, I was lucky enough to win a winebid auction for one of your 1992 Wellington Estate Bottled Old Vines Criolla. I'm experimenting more and more with older wines (as are a lot of wooters who seem to have an overabundance of recent vintage wines). Any thoughts into what I might find upon poppin' this bad boy?

Thanks as always.

It's probably way over the hill - that was a fairly light wine (made from the "Mission" grape). It might be interesting - you never know. Let me know what it's like, if you don't mind.

SonomaBouliste

If I recall correctly, in "The Billionaire's Vinegar", there was a mention of someone submitting an article to one of the wine magazines about how to fake a number of famous old vintages.

And since I've mentioned that book, has anyone else here read it and if so, any opinions? (I know that clayfu was reading it the same time that I was.) Not to put too fine a point upon it, I enjoyed it, partly because Wallace has a sympathetic writing style and partly for the glimpses into an esoteric world

I seem to be responding to Peter's literary twist by bringing up books/films about wine. So here's a twisted quote for him and rpm:

"Wherever wine is resorted to as a strong religion, and as an escape from the dull, monotonous round of home, those of its vintners who pepper the highest will be the surest to please."

This can't be the last of the Ramblings, it just can't - please, SB, I want some more.

-- T
(Was that last comment OT or not?)

Definitely not the last. As mentioned before, I just don't have the time and energy to write one every other week.

The Billionaire's Vinegar was a fun read - interesting to get some insight into the trophy hunter / one-upsmanship crowd.

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